The concert hall

or how I experience Enlightenment in everyday life.

First check out what I mean by Enlightenment, in the book article ‘Beingness, Enlightenment (enlightened)’: I use the term Enlightenment to denote the state where essential non-separateness (of all phenomena, including all beings) has become a persons real knowledge – through actually noticing it for themselves.

And there we have it: How to continue functioning as an individual mind-energy-body organism, when you are actually noticing the non-separation all the time – meaning you ARE also all those other beings which you are noticing? For some – including myself – this is not easy, and I have written a lot more about it in the section of the book on Boundaries.

This short article is an allegorical introduction to the topic, and especially on how I have learned to deal with it.

After decades of exercises, my noticing in Universal Awareness had loosened up and expanded to the extent that I kept falling into everyone and everything I met or saw, being non-separate from them. I found it almost impossible to function in normal everyday life in a state like that, in particular as I could not voluntarily turn it off. Praise be, it has nowadays subsided to a manageable level.

This is what living with Enlightenment is like for me nowadays:

Imagine you walk into the the back of a large concert hall. The lighting is dim, the hall is packed, the musicians have not yet appeared on stage. Many in the audience are talking softly with each other, so that you hear a background murmur of voices. It’s a bit like the static of a radio not tuned to any station. You can hear the sum of voices but no individual voice. So you can still get on with your own thoughts and actions, as you hardly notice the susurration of voices (but you do know that it’s there). What I’m hoping to express with this analogy is how I perceive the non-separation: I always know it’s there, it’s like a susurration of Being in the background.

Now, you walk down a particular isle towards your seat. Doing so you come close to individual members of the audience. If you wanted to, you could briefly focus your hearing on the conversations of the people you pass; you can also choose to not focus on them, or simply ignore them by habit. This equates to the options which I have regarding noticing the non-separation with people I pass on the street.

Finally, you find the row with your numbered seat in the middle, and must interact directly with some people to ask them to let you get to your seat. Then you sit there and have little option than to notice the conversations of people in your direct vicinity. It’s about like that for me, perceiving the non-separation with people with whom I have direct interaction. The effect varies, sometimes almost nothing, sometimes enough to awaken old trauma.

You might find this analogy sort of helpful but still wonder what the noticing of non-separation actually feels like. Good question. I can only say: DTFE – Do The F***ing Exercises!